We love our phones like they’re our children, constantly picking them up for a check-in. However, phone addiction is a real thing. You know the drill: at every ping you’re a slave to looking at the screen; you hungrily search for notifications as you sit on the loo; you take it to bed with you; you reach for it before you reach for your partner for a cuddle when you wake up. In fact, the Telstra Smartphone and Tablet Index revealed 84 percent of owners keep their phone within arm’s reach and 71 percent keep them turned on 24/7.

It’s all black and white
However, there is a feature on the iPhone that could stop us from getting too emotionally attached to our phones. First mooted as an option by tech ethicist Tristan Harris, who used to work at Google, “Grayscale”, which you can find under the settings menu, removes all the colors from your phone.

Slave to Silicon Valley

Apple

Like Poker Machine designers, tech giants such as Facebook, Instagram, Twitter and gaming apps such as Candy Crush know how to use colors, shapes and sounds that keep us addicted to their product. Draining the color from the screen simply makes it less appealing to look at and eliminates all the tricks they’ve used to keep you a slave.

In an article in the New York Times, Mack McKelvey, marketing chief at SalientMG, likened smartphone operating system and app design to cereal boxes from a supermarket shelf. “You don’t buy black-and-white cereal boxes, you buy the really stimulating colored one and these apps have developed really cool tiles, cool shapes, cool colors, all designed to stimulate you,” she said.

It’s kind of tricky to find in the settings menu so here’s a guide to give you your life back.